A 56-year-old man died last week after going into medical distress aboard a vessel that federal agents stopped west of San Clemente Island, according to a press release from the U.S. Coast Guard's Southwest District. The stop happened on Wednesday, July 29, and involved 21 people agents suspect had crossed into the country unlawfully.
A Tip From an Unlikely Source
Nobody was patrolling for this boat — someone spotted it and called it in. Just before noon, watchstanders at Coast Guard Sector Los Angeles-Long Beach fielded a call from a good Samaritan describing a vessel behaving oddly near San Clemente Island. Marine Interdiction Agents with Customs and Border Protection's Air and Marine Operations tracked the boat down and boarded it, counting 21 people aboard, while a Coast Guard crew from Station Los Angeles-Long Beach came in to assist.
San Clemente Island, part of the Channel Islands, lies south of Long Beach at a distance of roughly 55 miles, according to the the Spokesman-Review. That same account placed the interception itself more than 70 miles from the Southern California mainland.
Compressions at Sea, Then in the Air
Once agents boarded, they found the 56-year-old man unresponsive and began chest compressions immediately. Getting him real medical help meant scrambling a helicopter: a Coast Guard Air Station Ventura MH-60 Jayhawk crew was pulled off its usual patrol route to fly out for a medical evacuation. The crew hoisted him aboard mid-flight, and the Coast Guard said its aircrew "continued CPR while transporting him" to Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center in Los Angeles.
Doctors at the Westwood hospital managed to restart his heart once he arrived, but he could not be sustained and was pronounced dead a short time afterward, per the Coast Guard. Officials still haven't released his name, his nationality, or an official cause of death. FOX 11 Los Angeles reported that the boat's point of departure remains unknown and that no decision has been announced on whether anyone will face charges over the voyage.
Twenty Others, a Routine Handoff
The remaining 20 people were detained where they stood and turned over to U.S. Border Patrol, the standard next step once migrants pulled from a boat are confirmed safe and identified.
This wasn't an isolated stop. A Coast Guard release from January 13 describes crews intercepting a panga carrying 15 people about 24 miles southwest of San Clemente Island; all 15 claimed Mexican nationality and were handed to another Department of Homeland Security agency at Ballast Point. Then in February, a much larger operation unfolded: a Coast Guard Southwest District release describes five suspected smuggling vessels intercepted south of San Clemente Island in under 90 minutes, with Navy support from the littoral combat ship USS Augusta, resulting in 62 people taken into custody. And in April, the Department of Justice announced complaints against 29 Mexican nationals stopped aboard a panga roughly 10 miles south of San Nicolas Island — while stressing, as prosecutors always must, that a complaint is only an allegation.
Wednesday's death is the first fatality reported among this year's stops in these waters, a grim reminder that even a successful interdiction can end badly for the people making the crossing.
